Monday, March 25, 2013

Serial Woes

When I serialized my first draft of DERELICT on Wattpad and on its own blog, I had no idea what to expect. My first draft process is generally a very private one. If I show it to anyone, I may share a scene or three or use my husband as a plot sounding board, but beyond that, it's between me, my strange subconscious, and my laptop.

But I'm never one for complacency in my process and I saw this experiment in public accountability as a way to shake up my writing a bit. Plus, DERELICT was something different than I'd been writing and I saw the serialization process as sending up a trial balloon.

All in all, I really enjoyed seeing readers get engaged and really enjoy the story.

(Aside and an update: It's been revised and is currently with my agent, in preparation for submission. An editor at one of the big SF&F publishers I met at a recent conference asked for it--not saying more than that, lest I jinx things!)

Which brings me to my problem.

I have a 'trunk' novel (e.g., the early novel you stuff into a trunk under your bed because it should never, ever see the light of readership) that I'm now completely renovating. (No, that's not a typo or wrong word. Have you ever done a gut renovation of an old house? That's what this process is like. Tear down to the studs. Rebuild.)

I have an entirely new first 25% and a solid plan for integrating what worked of the original storyline. And I'd love to serialize the story as I rework it.

BUT, I don't have a title.

Well, I had a title, but I never liked the title. It didn't fit when I first drafted the novel and it doesn't work now. I can't serialize an unnamed story. The 411 on the fantasy-story-with-the-unsatisfying-name:

Lilliane Tor, a renowned empathic healer from Rimland, learns the cost of keeping her oath when she saves the life of Jahnissim Hal Zev, a member of the nomadic and insular Tisreen and becomes entangled in a diplomatic nightmare. A fugitive from her own land, and in search of her missing sister, she escapes to Tisreen with Zev and enters a bewildering world of a rigid religion and culture, where women's roles are tightly controlled and political disputes are settled on the edge of a blade. And where hudessh, or The Divine Obligation, is as binding as any healer's oath.

That Zev owes his life to a woman, and one who doesn't follow his beliefs challenges the foundations of his identity. When he finds evidence of an illegal slave trade poisoning the heart of both their countries, Zev must learn to trust Lilliane, working with her against a common evil. Their quest to unravel the truth, rescue Lilliane's sister, and expose the trade threatens their lives, the stability of two governments, and the core of their own beliefs about one another.

A few questions:
1--would you be interested in reading it?
2--what do I call this blasted thing???


1 comment:

  1. Well, I'd love to read how you renovate it, but I have no idea what you should call it. "Obligatory Toleration?" .... Wow, that one is bad. What would you say is the theme?

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